No (Son)tag line today

I won't pretend to have an opinion on Susan Sontag.

Here's a link to someone who does. Here's another one.

PS. I riveted to the footage of mass natural destruction. Especially, since Nate Berkus, of Oprah fame, was among the people in Thailand.

Read My Lips: New taxes

Is it just me, or does this feel like a NY street con? A shell game.

While Bush is indeed cutting certain taxes, he's simply imposing new ones in other places. It's a joke.

Eliminating the deductability of state and local taxes is going to raise taxes on dozens of millions of people, most notably in the blue states of NY and CA. The good news is that the Republican mayors and governors of these states are going to get fucked.

Money quote:

"New York City is the economic engine of our country and we already send $11.5 billion more to Washington annually than we get back," Mr. Bloomberg said in a written statement. "This would amount to another federal tax on our citizens and I will fight it tooth and nail."

Something New To Talk About

I'm getting sick and tired of writing about foregin policy. It's really the same thing over and over. US policy sucks, our options are even worse, and inertia is setting in. On the positive side, Bush & Co. are set to take a nasty fall over the whole mess.

So I'm going to change subjects.

But before I do, here's James Dobbins, former U.S. Special Envoy in Kosovo, Bosnia, Haiti, Somalia, and Afghanistan, talking about how bad we suck, specifically in reference to Iraq.

Money quote: By losing the trust of the Iraqi people, the Bush administration has already lost the war in Iraq. Moderate Iraqis can still win it, but only if they wean themselves from Washington and get support from elsewhere. To help them, the United States should pull out its troops as soon as it can without jeopardizing the elections, train Iraqis to beat the insurgency on their own, and rally Iran and European allies to the cause.

Sounds easy right?

Quality, not Quantity, of Troops in Iraq

Here's a little armchair General-izing:
It's the quality of the troops that is deficient in the US occupation of Iraq.

Analysis, you say? Facts?
Riddle me this: why is it that the strongest army in the world, with the most advanced training and weapons systems, is incapable of quelling an insurgency 1/10 its size?
There's a trap built into the question. We are obviously mighty and well-armed, so that can't be it. Troop levels? Nah.

Could it be....our intelligence? We know our intelligence sucks from that time when those planes hit those towers. Is this seeping into the quality of the training of our troops? Could it be affecting the quality of our fight against the insurgency?

On top of all this, we are inadequately supplied, it seems. The Army National Guard revealed last Thursday that it had missed its recruiting goals for the past two months by 30 percent. According to the NY Times, nearly 900 troops have been evacuated from Iraq by the Army for psychiatric reasons, included attempts or threatened attempts at suicide. When the war in Afghanistan as well as Iraq is considered, some experts believe that the number of American troops needing mental health treatment could exceed 100,000.

I hate to say it, but I hope to God that Rumsfeld takes the fall for this.

Privatize the Army

Hey, it's not THAT crazy of an idea. Maureen Dowd suggested it today in the NY Times, seemingly tongue in cheek. But considering that it is being run about as well as the government has handled education, national security and social security, it's a pretty gread idea.

Money quote:

Why should it just be parents of kids in Iraq who send them compasses and Kevlar vests? Everybody wants to support our troops.

If the Olympics can attract top corporate sponsors, why can't Rummy's Global War on Terrorism? Bring it on, Bank One!

Picture this: a truck rumbling across the desert on the evening news, completely armored and emblazoned with golden arches. Or a fleet of Visa Humvees. You know Donald Trump would love to slap his name on a few Chinooks. The 82nd Trumpborne.

And what about product placement? When soldiers give their Christmas greetings on Fox News or MSNBC, they could be holding cans of Pepsi or calling home on Samsung phones. Why merely send their love when they could be writing love letters in the sand on Apple computers?

Like athletes or Nascar drivers, they could sell every inch of their body: STP helmets, Nike boots, Staples "Yeah, we got that" dog tags, Starbucks M.R.E.'s, CamelBak canteens by Camels, Sony laser target designators.

All those old, out-of-shape reservists being dragged back by Rummy would be great pitchmen for arthritis medication. And Celebrex night vision goggles.

The really big corporate sponsors might set up some hospitality yurts dispensing Wellbutrin in the desert. Sure, security's so bad that Rummy was afraid to go any farther than Kuwait last week, but Michael Eisner might want to visit with some Disney imagineers and check out a different kind of Fantasyland: the neocon variety. Mr. Eisner could use some good publicity.

In this day and age, when every sports arena has been hideously renamed for some corporate entity - like Minute Maid Park in Houston, Network Associates Coliseum in Oakland, Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego and FedEx Field in D.C. - Rummy could easily think big.

How about the American Express Green Zone? Instead of those four huge facsimiles of Saddam's head that adorned the Iraqi Republican Palace, why not put up big heads (and necks) of Geoffrey, the Toys "R" Us giraffe?

Whole units could begin shopping themselves on eBay and trolling for corporate sponsors, just as the Dartmouth swimming team did in 2002 with the pitch, "This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to own a piece of N.C.A.A. Division I collegiate memorabilia."

What's a measly swimming team compared with the thrill of ponying up for the Third Infantry Division of Fort Stewart, Ga., the Army unit that conducted the famous "thunder run" and took Baghdad - and is now about to be redeployed in Iraq?

Rummy's a little distracted trying to get his silly space shield, which fizzled yet again in a test yesterday, and fighting hard for his job, so it may take him awhile to focus on privatizing. Meanwhile, we still have that pesky armor shortage.

So how about Tommy "Stop Writing Books and Finish the War" Franks, Paul "You Disbanded the Iraqi Army, Dummy" Bremer and George "Slam-Dunk" Tenet taking off those preposterous
Medals of Freedom and contributing them. Just as Scarlett and Melanie took off their gold wedding rings for the Confederate cause, those medals can be melted down for a little Humvee armor.

With help like that and some corporate support - maybe Levitra could even sponsor his next trip to Iraq - Rummy could get the Army he wants and wishes to have sooner rather than later. Like, while we're actually fighting a war.

The sponsors could help a lot in keeping the Army in top shape. After all, our troops could be stuck there for years, perhaps decades. And could even wind up defending an Iraqi ayatollah.

With all the foreign companies investing, we could finally have a real coalition. The coalition of the shilling. No German troops, but why not a Passat partnership?

With allies like these....

One of the current administrations oft repeated distortions concerns the Coalition of the Willing, and the inclusion of Pakistan as an example of "how far we've come" in the GWOT.

I've always contended that Republicans have a very very poor understanding of the region, but their insistence that Pakistan is a friend represents a genuine miscalculation of dangerous proportions. While the elite segment of society, encompassing the wealthy and the powerful, may be outwardly friendly to the United States, it is the very same segment's unwillingness to engage the far more numerous and dangerously populated segment of Pakistani society that should be troubling to Americans.

James Risen and David Rohde of the New York Times write about how Pakistan has subtly foiled our quest to find Bin Laden, infiltrate his new core group of followers, or gather any sort of intelligence in Pakistan since the GWOT began. Money quote:

More than three years after the Sept. 11 attacks on the Pentagon and New York transformed Osama bin Laden into the most wanted man in the world, the search for him remains stalled, frustrated by the remote topography of his likely Pakistani sanctuary, stymied by a Qaeda network that remains well financed and disciplined, sidetracked by the distractions of the Iraq war, and, perhaps most significantly, limited by deep suspicion of the United States among Pakistanis.

If anyone believes that brute force alone can overcome this need only read the following:

On Sept. 9, for example, an air raid near the village of Dela in South Waziristan killed as many as 80 civilians. Young men from the Mehsud tribe, many of whose members died in the incident, began flocking to the militants. "That was a turning point," said Rahimullan Yusufzai, a Pakistani journalist. "Their friends, their relatives and people they knew were killed."

But the US is sitting on its laurels. There is apparently a secret plan to reinstate a dormant propaganda unit within the Pentagon aimed on winning over "Hearts & Minds" in foreign lands.

Pentagon and military officials directly involved in the debate say that such a secret propaganda program, for example, could include planting news stories in the foreign press or creating false documents and Web sites translated into Arabic as an effort to discredit and undermine the influence of mosques and religious schools that preach anti-American principles.

Does anyone there have a brain? Even if this were true, how could let something like this leek out.

More Evidence of Republican disdain for Science

In today's NY Times, money quote:

Congress has cut the budget for the National Science Foundation, an engine for research in science and technology, just two years after endorsing a plan to double the amount given to the agency.

The $388 billion spending bill for the current fiscal year, approved by both houses of Congress on Nov. 20, provides $5.473 billion for the National Science Foundation, which is $105 million less than it got last year and $272 million less than President Bush requested.

"I am astonished that we would make this decision at a time when other nations continue to surpass our students in math and science and consistently increase their funding of basic research," said Mr. Ehlers, a former physics professor who is chairman of a technology subcommittee. "

The National Science Foundation supports technological innovation that is crucial to the sustained economic prosperity that America has enjoyed for several decades."

While cutting the budget of the science foundation, Congress found money for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame in Birmingham, the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville, bathhouses in Hot Springs, Ark., and hundreds of similar projects.

Anti-Matter: The Bush Doctrine

Halfway through what will become the Bush Legacy, it is becoming clear that what he will be remembered for is inverting the American Ideal, the American Dream, and America: the Symbol.

There's the obvious:
The importation of faith into the public sphere. This is different from religion. Religion has always held a place in the public sphere, in the sense that religion is protected, tolerated, and meant to be separate from the State. But faith as a concept was never an American ideal. Americans were always trained pragmatists, scientists and workers. For a far more salient commentary on the rejection of science and the scientific method in America today, see Small Precautions.

The NY Observer has a great piece on this very subject, from a political point of view. Money quote:

The cost of destroying a secular public life will, if allowed to proceed, undermine the stability of American democracy. All these people on their knees holding candles may not appreciate it, but public religion, not private religious formation, is the enemy of our kind of government. Even in the long-past era when most Americans were some brand or other of Calvinist, religion had to be pushed into the corners of politics so that a nascent secular culture could nourish democracy. In the first half of the 19th century, the battle to drive religion out of the political forum and into the home was not easily nor ever entirely won. Waves of religious mania battered the country and threatened democratic institutions and practice. They still do.

The Christians and their churches, which are using their temporary, strategic, electoral-minority position to gain majority dominance, will live to wish that they hadn’t labored so long to put "people of faith" in the driver’s seat. Other than dogmatism and a built-in resistance to reason, logic and science, sectarian religions have nothing in common except a potential antagonism for each other—one which holds the threat of someday ripping the country to shreds. "Religion" and "faith" are pushing ahead on a common front now, but in due course they will fall on each other with mortal fury. History teaches that the one thing religions hate more than secularism is other religions. With each year that religions are encouraged and given a preferential place, they become more demanding and more truculent in claiming more power and deference. As more members of more religious organizations adopt peculiar and distinguishing forms of dress, headgear and hair, the lines harden and the probability of physical conflict between these groups of faith-based fanatics
grows.

Now you can add Bush's approach to immigration to this list, for which I will keep a running tally. Really, there are two policies here. Given illegals who cross the border temporary working visas. Keep students out. Does anyone see how stupid this is? Raise your hands. Joseph Nye Jr. writes about this in today's NY Times.

Money quote:

Last year, the number of foreign students at American colleges and universities
fell for the first time since 1971. Recent reports show that total foreign student enrollment in our 2,700 colleges and universities dropped 2.4 percent,
with a much sharper loss at large research institutions. Two-thirds of the 25
universities with the most foreign students reported major enrollment declines.

The costs to the American economy are significant. Educating foreign students is a $13 billion industry. Moreover, the United States does not produce enough home-grown doctoral students in science and engineering to meet our needs. The shortfall is partly made up by the many foreign students who stay here after earning their degrees.

Congress is the last refuge of scoundrels

Why oh why has the mainstream media remained silent on the ridiculous accusations thrown out by DeLay against the Ronnie Earle, the prosecutor in Texas who is looking for an indictment?

Bravo to the Gray Lady for publishing Earle's Op-Ed today.

The main point is that regardless of how partisan he may be, it is a grand jury of citizen peers who will decide whether or not to indict him, NOT Ronnie Earle. And they will indict him if he committed a crime, and there is enough evidence to convince them that he should at the very least answer some questions.

And as a side note, of the 15 people Ronnie Earle has prosecuted, 12 were Democrats. Quite simply, Texas was a Democratic state until recently, and as Earle put it, "most crimes by elected officials involve the abuse of power; you have to have power before you can abuse it. "

The Looming Iranian Crisis

It's amazing that the broadcast stations are focusing on Specter, the Cabinet and the Clinton library, and virtually ignoring the DeLay crime syndicate and the Iranian nucular threat.

From today's NY Times:

A European diplomat familiar with the British-French-German initiative said they were also pessimistic that Iran would back off its nuclear ambitions, but that they had no choice but to engage Iran because military options were distasteful or impractical after the troubled invasion and occupation of Iraq.

American policy is truly non-existent. They literally have their heads up their ass. They have no idea what to do, who to turn to (they've even contemplated working with the UN!!), or how to get the Iranians to come to the table.

On the other hand, many in the administration say that Iran is not likely to enter into talks with the United States, as the Europeans want, because the revolutionary clerics who control the government are unalterably opposed to engaging with a country it considers the enemy.

Great.

Running on empty

This is unbelievable. How can this be getting so little attention? We are literally running on empty. What the hell has happened to the Republicans? Fiscal responsibility used to be their clarion call, but they have completely abandoned all reason. On top of the higher debt cieling, Bush and his crime family want to make the tax cuts permanent, privatize social security and they need another $70 billion for Iraq!!!

From the Center for American Progress:

Conservatives waited until after the election was over to breach the country's debt ceiling. Although the country actually reached $7.4 trillion in debt in early October, Treasury Secretary John Snow employed a host of accounting tricks to technically avoid breaching the limit. One trick even including suspending investments in the Civil Service Retirement and Disability Fund. Snow's moves were directly designed to prevent conservatives in the House from having to vote on such a politically sensitive matter in the weeks before the election.

From today's NY Times:

The bill, if approved by the House in a vote expected on Thursday, would authorize the third big increase in the federal borrowing since President Bush took office in 2001. Federal debt has ballooned by $1.4 trillion over the past four years, to $7.4 trillion, and the new ceiling would allow borrowing to reach $8.2 trillion.

With no end in sight to the huge annual budget deficits, which hit a record of $412 billion this year, lawmakers predicted on Wednesday that the new ceiling would probably have to be raised again in about a year.

But what does all this mean? Our debt is not owned by Visa. It is owned by our trading partners, which puts us in a very awkward, un-American position. John Kerry had this to say on the Senate floor:

"To pay our bills, America now goes cup in hand to nations like China, Korea, Taiwan and Caribbean banking centers," Mr. Kerry said. "Those issues didn't go away on Nov. 3, no matter what the results."

In 2002, the Bush administration received a debt limit increase of $450 billion dollars. The next year the Treasury requested, and Congress delivered, a $984 billion dollar credit line, the largest in history. That amount exceeded "all of the debt inherited by President Ronald Reagan, which was all of the debt accumulated from Bunker Hill [1776] to 1981." The Bush administration and its conservative allies have blown through nearly a trillion dollars in just 18 months.

According to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, if President Bush succeeds in passing his 2005 budget – which includes an extension of expiring tax cuts – the government will rack up about $6.2 trillion in additional debt between now and 2014, nearly doubling our current debt ($7.38 trillion) for a total of $14.5 trillion.

Interest payments on the mounting debt, which exceeded $321 billion in fiscal year 2004, also squeezes out funding for other priorities like education and health care.

Doc Rice? REALLY!?!

Day 1 has been a pretty shitty day for Doc Rice, so far. And sadly, as a mindless-drone, she's going to have to rely on Bush for her marching orders. What is she going to tackle first?

Israel/Palestine?
The announcement of Russia's new nucular missle?
Saudi Arabian terrorist financing?
The Iranian/EU deal? It seems the National Council for Resistance in Iran has announced that the Iranians are lying. We don't like the NCRI, but they're good at gathering intelligence.
How about the bombings in Argentina this morning?
No, wait, how about Margaret Hassan?

Poor Condi.

And in other news, Zarqawi has moved to Mosul. Things are calm now, apparently. Another battle won?
And the NY Times editorial about why we can't win against an insurgency is fascinating.

Maragaret Hassan believed dead

The inevitable has happened. Initial reports of the murder of Maragaret Hassan, the British national/long-time resident of Iraq, are beginning to trickle in. A video has surfaced on Al Jazeera showing Hassan being shot. If confirmed, she would be the first foreign woman to be executed by the insurgents in Iraq.

A few thoughts:

• Strange that they would shoot her, and not behead her, as they have done others.
• Why did they wait until after the American elections? Is it presumptuous to assume that they would be cognizant of the American political calendar? Am I a horrible person for wondering how this would have influenced the election had she been murdered two weeks ago?

With such a "strong electoral mandate", I doubt very much that the Bush administration is going to react to this murder at all.

Exchanging a pearl for a lollipop

NY Times reports on the "agreement" reached by Europe and Iran on the suspension of Iran's nucular ambitions.

Are they serious?

Here, we'll give you whatever you want. More trade? More money? What do you need? Just please stop enriching uranium (so openly) or Uncle Sam will get really really mad at us for being such shitty negotiators. But don't worry, he's too weak to do anything to you. We know you want WTO membership, but Uncle Sam said no. You kidnapped some of his kids 30 years ago, and he said you can't trade with us. But we'll trade with you anyway. Just please stop embarrassing us.

Buried at the end of the article is the money quote:

Making concessions on its nuclear program has been widely unpopular inside Iran, and Mr. Rowhani was put on the defensive by conservative Iranian journalists.

When a reporter for the official Islamic Republic News Agency remarked, "The reason Iran has given so many concessions is because the Iranian team was weak," Mr. Rowhani replied that the country's best diplomats had conducted the negotiations and "this is the outcome of our best diplomacy."

Another Iranian journalist cited an interview in an Iranian newspaper that accused Iran of giving "a pearl in exchange for a lollipop."

"That's not true," Mr. Rowhani shot back.

The Budget Deficit according to WSJ

55 economists participated in a Wall Street Journal survey about the priorities of a second Bush term.

Shockingly, the majority cited the "yawning budget deficit" as their biggest concern.

"...the economists caution that the deficit is likely to be a persistent long-term problem and they don't expect the president to have as much success in dealing with the deficit as he will have in addressing other economic issues."

"The budget deficit is a particularly intractable issue, economists say, because of continued spending demands."

""The bottom line here is, if we don't get a significant narrowing of the budget deficit, you're going to have increasing upward pressure on interest rates. That will increase private savings in the economy, but it will also slow the rate of the growth of the economy."

Told ya so.

It's NOT the Culture, Stupid!

A great article by Frank Rich and why it's NOT the culture stupid.

Money quote:

If anyone is laughing all the way to the bank this election year, it must be the undisputed king of the red cultural elite, Rupert Murdoch. Fox News is a rising profit center within his News Corporation, and each red-state dollar that it makes can be plowed back into the rest of Fox's very blue entertainment portfolio. The Murdoch cultural stable includes recent books like Jenna Jameson's "How to Make Love Like a Porn Star" and the Vivid Girls' "How to Have a XXX Sex Life," which have both been synergistically, even joyously, promoted on Fox News by willing hosts like Rita Cosby and, needless to say, Mr. O'Reilly. There are "real fun parts and exciting parts," said Ms. Cosby to Ms. Jameson on Fox News's "Big Story Weekend," an encounter broadcast on Saturday at 9 p.m., assuring its maximum exposure to unsupervised kids.

Almost unnoticed in the final weeks of the campaign was the record government indecency fine levied against another prime-time Fox television product, "Married by America." The $1.2 million bill, a mere bagatelle to Murdoch stockholders, was more than twice the punishment inflicted on Viacom for Janet Jackson's "wardrobe malfunction." According to the F.C.C. complaint, one episode in this heterosexual marriage-promoting reality show included scenes in which "partygoers lick whipped cream from strippers' bodies," and two female strippers "playfully spank" a man on all fours in his underwear. "Married by America" is gone now, but Fox remains the go-to network for Paris Hilton ("The Simple Life") and wife-swapping ("Trading Spouses: Meet Your New Mommy").

None of this has prompted an uprising from the red-state Fox News loyalists supposedly so preoccupied with "moral values." They all gladly contribute fungible dollars to Fox culture by boosting their fair-and-balanced channel's rise in the ratings. Some of these red staters may want to make love like porn stars besides. (Not that there's anything wrong with that.) An ABC News poll two weeks before the election found that more Republicans than Democrats enjoy sex "a great deal." The Democrats' new hero, Illinois Senator-elect Barack Obama, was assured victory once his original, ostentatiously pious Republican opponent, Jack Ryan, dropped out of the race rather than defend his taste for "avant-garde" sex clubs.

Iran, Forrest, Iran!!!!

Iran is the new Iraq.

Everyone's GOT to have an opinion on Iran these days. Where to begin? There's not much to say. We're screwed. They're going to make promises to the Euros, they'll stall for time, and go nucular. There's not much more to it. And there's not a damn thing we can do about it.

Iraq has been such a fiasco that we have lost total threat credibility. If we threaten them, I guarantee that their response will be, "Go ahead! We dare you!!". Since we know "for a fact" that there will be no draft, where are we going to get the soldiers? We also know we can't pay for another invasion/occupation. Not to mention that Iran is 4 times the land mass and three times the population of Iraq. AND we don't even know where the reactors are. At least in Iraq, we sort of knew because of 10 years of inspections. AND, I am willing to bet money that we will get NO COALITION.

William F. Buckley agrees.

As does the Economist.

The Iraq War - State by State

The Center for American progress has published a very useful interactive map where you can see how much the war in Iraq has cost your state, and contrasts it with how much money your state has received for Homeland Security and for No Child Left Behind. It highlights, magnifies and exposes my main contention that this administration does not care about its citizens.

For instance, New York State has paid $13,000,000,000 for the war in Iraq (of which New York City paid $4,000,000,000) but has only received $4,250,000,000 in funding for Homeland Security. In other words the NY State government is spending three times more to keep Iraqis safe than it is to keep me safe. And No Child Left Behind? Only $1,830,000,000. So we're stupid AND in danger.

This disparity is even greater in states without terrorist magnets like New York. Texas paid $11.5B for the war, but only got $1.93B for Homeland Security and $1.81 for No Child Left Behind!!

Flamboyant Republican Arthur Finkelstein Bashes Bush

Wow. This is via The Note, who got it from the NY Post.

Arthur Finkelstein, NY Governor Pataki's top political advisor and successful advisor in several Israeli elections, was interviewed last Friday in the Israeli paper Maariv and basically tore Bush a new one. Among his many claims was that the Republican party, and therefore the American government, has been hijacked by the far-right.

Shocking? Hardly.

"Bush's victory not only establishes the power of the American Christian right in this candidacy, but in fact established its power to elect the next Republican president."

Finkelstein also accused Bush of trying to "dictate to America how to live and what to believe in." Other notable points: Bush is more interesting in banning abortion than he is in winning the war in Iraq; more interested in banning gay marriages than improving the American economy.

Ouch.

My favorite part in the NY Post article part is at the end:

A prominent Republican familiar with the interview called Finkelstein's comments "a big embarrassment for Pataki.

"Arthur isn't comfortable being a Republican anymore when he's so unhappy with our success and that's why he's so flamboyantly bashing the president."

Interesting choice of the word "flamboyant". Finkelstein is gay.

I have to admire Republican party operatives' discipline in sticking to message. They don't excoriate their losers, but they murder dissenters. When somebody dissents, they discredit him (in this case by highlighting his homosexuality, which in the Republican party, is reason to be discredited). It's the polar opposite of Democrats. They welcome debate, but eviscerate election losers, although in this case Kerry might be disprove that theory with a victorious return to the Senate.

Update: NY Times writes about it a day later.

Dean & Deluca are hurting the economy

According to the Wall Street Journal, surging food imports are exacerbating the trade deficit.

Money quote:

Agriculture, one of the few big sectors of the economy that could be counted on to produce trade surpluses, has recently generated monthly deficits -- a development that could worsen the nation's already significant trade imbalance....

But the problem with the widening overall trade deficit is that it is sustainable only as long as foreigners are willing to lend the U.S. large amounts of money. Many economists warn that this isn't likely to continue, and if they're correct, the risks are growing for a market-rattling crash in the value of the dollar....

The overall trade deficit widened to $54 billion in August, the most recent monthly figure available. That was the second-biggest gap on record after June's $55 billion.

During the 1990s, the agriculture sector's ability to single-handedly cut the trade deficit by as much as 16% some years gave it political capital in Washington, helping justify billions of dollars in annual farm subsidies. Now, agriculture's shrinking impact on the trade scene, plus the swelling federal budget deficit, could make it harder for the farm lobby to protect those subsidies.

The U.S. is still the world's biggest agricultural exporter. But the agricultural-trade surplus is evaporating so quickly that some economists in the Bush administration are quietly speculating that the sector might generate an annual trade deficit as soon as the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2005. That would be the first since 1959, when postwar Europe re-emerged as a major farm power.

Rumors of Kerry Redux

Huh!?!? Wasn't once enough. I am valiantly resisting the Democratic tendency to skewer our losers, but the last thing I want (after a Hillary candidacy) would be the return of Kerry onto a Presidentail ticket. I think he should stay in the Senate and be a beacon of hope in a hostile Congress.

But rumors are flying that he may again reach for national office, having seen the chalice up so close.

From the LA Times:

"There's a tradition," said Robert Farmer, who was campaign treasurer for Dukakis in 1988 and Kerry this year. "Nixon ran and lost and then won, Reagan ran and lost, then won. In this case, you'll have to look at the field and say to yourself, 'Could another candidate have won states that John Kerry didn't win?' And my sense is that I don't think anybody could have done much better than John Kerry did."

From the Washington Post:

Aides said Kerry is relishing the prospect of renewed combat with President Bush, fighting such measures as the president's proposal to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling. Kerry has spent most of the past two years on the campaign trail, meaning that his return to Capitol Hill will be something of a reintroduction to colleagues.

Kerry's plans contrast starkly with the approach taken by former vice president Al Gore, who all but disappeared from the political scene after losing to Bush in the disputed 2000 presidential election.

Several Democrats expressed skepticism about Kerry's plans, saying they believe the party needs a fresh face and must turn a corner. One well-known Democratic operative who worked with the Kerry campaign said opposition to Bush, not excitement about Kerry, was behind the senator's fundraising success. "If he thinks he's going to capitalize on that going forward, he's in for a surprise," said the operative, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Exurbs - Yuck

David Brooks writes in the NY Times about his book on the new Exurb living phenomenon. Yuck, I say. But he says it holds the key to political victory.

Money quote:

On the one hand, people move to exurbs because they want some order in their lives. They leave places with arduous commutes, backbreaking mortgages, broken families and stressed social structures and they head for towns with ample living space, intact families, child-friendly public culture and intensely enforced social equality. That's bourgeois.

On the other hand, they are taking a daring leap into the unknown, moving to towns that have barely been built, working often in high-tech office parks doing pioneering work in biotech and nanotechnology. These exurbs are conservative but also utopian - Mayberrys with BlackBerrys.

The Republicans won in part because Bush and Rove understand this culture. Everybody is giving advice to Democrats these days, and mine is don't take any advice from anybody with access to the media - including me, just to be safe.

Get out into the sprawl, into that other conversation. Take your time. It's a new world out there.

It IS the Economy, Stupid

Bush talked about spending discipline in today's press conference, but simultaneoulsy asked for $147B for first quarter 2005, a new record. Even if held flat, it would equal $588B, another new record. The key point, as made below, is that all of this fiscal decisions leave very little room for error. Any event could quickly spiral the situation into crisis.

Excerpts today's NY Times:

Empowered by his own victory and stronger Republican majorities in Congress, Mr. Bush has pledged to push an economic agenda that could be more ambitious than the $1.9 trillion worth of tax cuts over 10 years that he signed in his first term.

The challenge ahead can be seen in the fiscal decline that took place between Mr. Bush's first inauguration in 2001 and his second one on Jan. 20, 2005. Federal tax revenue was $100 billion lower this year than when Mr. Bush took office, but spending is $400 billion higher.

Foreign investors have thus far been willing to finance the United States' borrowing, but most of that has come from central banks of Asian nations rather than private investors. If foreign appetite for Treasury securities wanes, interest rates would have to rise to make such investments attractive enough to keep money flowing into this country.

Making the job more difficult, politically as well as economically, is that higher oil prices have slowed American growth even as job creation continues to languish. Consumer and business confidence have slipped markedly in the last few months. And while oil prices declined modestly over several days until a $1.26-a-barrel rise on Wednesday, most forecasters are expecting economic growth to slow to 3 percent in 2005 from about 4 percent this year.

Mr. Bush has also promised to make his tax cuts permanent, which would add nearly $1 trillion to federal debt by 2014. And to avoid a huge tax increase for the upper middle class, he hopes to re-engineer the alternative minimum tax, a parallel tax that was created to prevent wealthy people from overusing tax deductions but that is expected to engulf as many as 30 million families by the end of this decade. That could cost more than $500 billion.

The biggest problem of all is the one that begins at the end of this decade: the looming retirement of 76 million baby boomers, which is expected to add trillions of dollars in new costs for Social Security and Medicare benefits.

Budget analysts say Mr. Bush can no longer blame slower economic growth or a weak stock market for the budget deficit, as he has in much of his first term, and he cannot count on faster economic growth to close the gap over the next four years.

"Policy choices will determine where we go,'' said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, director of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. "We will not grow our way out of this. It is no longer the case that we can blame everything on the economy.''

And that does not count the $500 billion for repairing the alternative minimum tax. Mr. Bush ordered the Treasury to come up with a comprehensive solution by early next year, and that proposal could form the basis of a broader plan to overhaul the income-tax system. Even if the costs of repairing the tax are submerged in a larger plan, they will be difficult to avoid.

More ominiously, said Mr. Holtz-Eakin, who worked in the Bush White House before becoming head of the Congressional Budget Office, there is little room for error. Almost any unexpected shock - a new recession, or a new military crisis - could push budget shortages higher than the gloomiest forecasters are predicting now.

The Coalition Falters

Bowing to internal pressue, another member of our grand coalition in Iraq has announced plans to leave. Hungary announced today that it would withdraw its 300 troops. Even worse, Doctors Without Borders is leaving due to "escalating violence".

To summarize, of the 32 countries that provided a whopping 22,000 troops:

• Spain withdrew its 1,300 troops
• The Dominican Republic withdrew 302 soldiers
• Nicaragua withdrew 115
• Honduras withdrew 370
• Costa Rica has no soldiers
• The Philippines withdrew its 51 in July
• Norway withdrew 155 military engineers
• New Zealand is withdrawing its 60 engineers
• Thailand has said it wants to bring home its 450 troops
• Singapore has reduced its contingent to 33, from 191
• Moldova has trimmed its force to 12, from 42
• Bulgaria's Defense Ministry said it would reduce its 483 troops to 430 next month
• Poland, the fourth-largest contributor, with 2,400 troops, says it intends to withdraw by the end of next year
• The Netherlands, with 1,400 troops, said this week that the latest rotation of troops would be its last contribution to Iraq

15 countries down. Who's left anyway? Well, newly re-elected US President George W. Bush's list of about 50 countries that openly backed the March 2003 invasion to topple Saddam Hussein was once easily found by following this link. No more: A visit to the White House web site found that the list has disappeared, and that the link that led to it -- "Who are the coalition members?" -- is gone as well.

Buck Up

I can't take it anymore. The hand wringing, crying and sadness are misplaced and unproductive. I am full of pride and hope for the future.

The Outcome

Bush only won by 3.5M votes against the most liberal Senator from New England, in the middle of a war, both military and cultural, and with certain economic indicators stabilizing. Furthermore, if you look at the state margins, an interesting pattern emerges. That's a powerful indictment against the strength of Bush's incumbency and mandate. This was NOT a Johnson/Goldwater defeat. For bottom liners, this may not mean much; but as members of the opposition, this should be heartening.

What really gets me angry is when pundits say that this proves that liberals are out of touch with what people in the Midwest think. Last I checked, we got 49% of the vote against an incumbent, and this includes 3-to-1 votes against gays, with the support of security moms and the soldiers. You could just as easily say that the Midwest is out of touch with what people on the Coasts think. The 3.5M vote gain was made up, in large part, of conservative increases in coastal, blue state suburbs. The margins in many of the red states actually tightened since 2000, which means that the Democrats made enormous inroads in the red states. With a little extra turnout and mobilization, New England may act glib in 2008.

The Mandates

Bush has an enormously difficult mandate as a member of the GOP. He has to ensure Republican succession, which means stabilizing Iraq, getting jobs, repairing diplomatic relations, privatizing social security, ensuring we are not attacked again, stopping a meltdown of the real estate market, keeping interest rates low, lowering the price of gas, strengthening the dollar, all while healing partisan divisions. This may be hard, to say the least, especially for a man of Bush’s character who doesn’t do subtlety, press conferences or transparency.

But more importantly, the Democratic Party also has a mandate. We must balance grace and ferocious determination. We must support the troops and hold the President accountable for massive strategic failures. We must spotlight economic folly and uphold our ideals in the face of a virtually identical but undeniable majority.

The Next Four Years

The Republicans have to find a successor. That is not going to be easy. Jeb Bush? Senators make bad candidates (McCain, Kerry). Will they resort to another Manchurian candidate? Mitch Daniels? Matt Blunt? Despite the 11-state sweep, gay marriage is likely to be a hot button issue in 2 years when MA rejects a constitutional amendment, and may only work more in the Republicans’ favor when CA, NY, NJ and OR add some sort of recognition to their books. It will be interesting to see how Democratic strategy adjusts to this.

Of a few things, I am certain: the Democratic candidate in 2008 MUST NOT BE a wealthy, liberal Senator from New England (Hilary included). We have shown that we can hold on to the Blue States even in the face of Karl Rove and his thugs, but, what we have not been able to do is turn some of those small Republican victories in the heartland into small Democratic victories. We need to find a candidate who can stand up to the neo-Cons on war and the economy, but more importantly on morality, in an effort to bring 3.5M voters over to the Democrats. A general repositioning of the Democratic Party as a party of faith might do it, and this includes faith-based ideals such as charity, equity and tolerance. This doesn’t mean pandering to Evangelicals. But it does mean highlighting Democratic relationships with the faithful, such as the eloquent and brilliant Obama. Read his acceptance speech to see what I mean.

We have four years to organize, fund raise, protest and mobilize; and more importantly, to pick a better candidate and run a stronger campaign. We can do it. We will do it. (NO NADER!!)

Missing Explosives

I find it ironic that Bush's response to the missing explosives is to accuse Kerry of making wild allegations without having the facts. Aren't we in Iraq right now because the President went to war without having the facts?

The Long Term Health of the Party

I’m beginning to think that a Bush win could be the best possible panacea for the Democratic Party in the long-term.

Regardless of who wins, the next President of the United States is going to inherit:

• a guerilla war in Iraq, replete with beheadings, fleeing coalition partners, and porous open borders. And no one will help us. Germany today has said that they would be willing to send in troops, but only for Kerry.
• record deficits which are increasing exponentially, exacerbated by a weak dollar
• failed energy and environmental policies
• failed education policies
• record high oil prices (and record high gas prices)
• high-tech jobs as well as manufacturing jobs have fled the country, leaving us with low-paying jobs with no benefits
• the religious right has gained a foothold in amending the Constitution

Regardless of who wins:

• the housing bubble will burst
• interest rates will rise
• medical costs will double AGAIN
• the cost of gas will double AGAIN

AND, Supreme Court seats will be vacated.

But Bush will probably not be able to appoint overtly right-wing judges, given the polarized climate in DC. The right-wing will turn on him. The citizens will turn on him, and the Republicans will lose the Senate, the House and the Presidency in 2008, probably to John Edwards, or Gov of VA Mark Warren, also a looker. Other prominent Democratic Governors include Bob Holden from Missouri, Mike Easley from NC. I like Brad Henry, Gov of OK, but he's only 40, and he looks like a liberal. Could we one day hope that someone like the Jewish Governor of Pennsylvania, Bob Rendell would be elected? Probably not in 2008. There are several other Democratic Governors, even in the South, but they don't have the national footprint to aspire to higher office.

In any event, in 2008, peace and prosperity will be restored. We will have at least another 8 years of Pax Americana under the Democrats. International relations will be restored. Innovation will again be prized and rewarded in this country. We will fix education, healthcare and civil liberties.

This could be great.

If Kerry wins, the Republicans will turn on him on Day 1. They will blame him for not being able to fix Bush's blunders fast enough. Right wing donations to the GOP will reach record-breaking levels, and McCain will oust him in 2008. Or worse, Schwartzenegger.

Niall Ferguson, a Harvard/Oxford/Hoover Institute historian, compared the situation to John Major's election to a second term, and subsequent ouster in 1997, in a piece in the Wall Street Journal in late August.

Money quote:

"The lesson of British history is that a second Bush term could be more damaging to the Republicans and more beneficial to the Democrats than a Bush defeat. If he secures re-election, President Bush can be relied upon to press on with a foreign policy based on pre-emptive military force, to ignore the impending fiscal crisis (on the Cheney principle that "deficits don't matter") and to pursue socially conservative objectives like the constitutional ban on gay marriage. Anyone who thinks this combination will serve to maintain Republican unity is dreaming; it will do the opposite. Meanwhile, the Dems will have another four years to figure out what the Labour Party finally figured out: It's the candidate, stupid. And when the 2008 Republican candidate goes head-to-head with the American Tony Blair, he will get wiped out."

Debate Part Deux

The best coverage of the debate by far was from Wonkette:

9:00 Charlie Gibson's gonna hold them to their time limits "forcefully but politely." Funny, that's what we like about Mr. Wonkette.
9:03 Kerry pats Bush on the back! Checking for that wire. . .
9:05 Weapon of mass deception! Hey, that's a. . . joke!
9:07 "I can see why your colleagues think he changes his position a lot... Because he does!" Bush was like wetting his pants to say that. And so he said it again!
9:09 Is it just me, or does Bush get more drawly when he's talking to, uhm, "a group of folks"?
9:14 Global test! Global test! Global test! Bush is so psyched. He's going to start jumping up and down and clapping his hands if someone asks about "frivolous lawsuits."
9:18 Bush: "I talk to Tony Blair all the time! He has an easy name!" (Also: He's not sighing, but he is about to throttle John Kerry.)
9:21 Love it when Bush talks about not joining the International Criminal Court. Do average Americans know what that is or do they think he's talking about the Superfriends?
9:23 Kerry meets with foreign leaders. Good thing Bush is in semi-hysterics or that would be an opening for him.
9:27 Bush is grinding his teeth into stumps. Oh, fuck: "That answer almost made me want to scowl." . . . Uhm. Yeah. I think I could hear crickets. I mean, that joke bombed. Bombed like a bad war.
9:29 Oh, yes. The rumors on the "internets." The interweb. Whatever. You have to excuse him. . . he mainly just uses it for porn.
9:31 Hmmmm. . . back door draft . . .
9:33 Good thing that no one really knows who Charlie Gibson is, or Bush steamrolling over him like a grumpy elderly driver would probably get noticed.
9:37Shorter Bush: "Stop fucking with me! Stop it! Stop fucking with me!"
9:39 The voice in his ear just told him to speak more quietly.
9:40 BREAKING: Canadians want to kill you with their pretend drugs.
9:41 Even worse: There is a third world (Jupiter?) that wants to kill you with its pretend drugs. However, Bush's plan does let you get a dimebag for just over a buck, if you're old. . .
9:42 A reader explains: "third world" means "people who do not look like me." So we revise our warning: Brown people want to kill you with their pretend drugs.
9:47 Again with the OB-GYNS. Let them practice their love, already. Also: Kerry is the first presidential candidate in history to go out of his way to remind people he's a lawyer.
9:49 Bush just called Kerry "Kennedy." He wishes. (Both of them.) Also: Kerry won an award! Yay Kerry!
9:50 Also: Yelling about OBGYNS, a reader points out, is not showing them much love at all.
9:53 Hey, wait: Bush comes from a "school of thought"? Where to begin. . .
9:54 I THINK I AM LOSING MY HEARING BECAUSE BUSH IS SCREAMING SO LOUD.
9:55 Mr. Kerry: Please do not look straight the camera again. You frighten me. (Not as much as BUSH'S SCREAMING, though.)
9:57 Kerry acknowledges wealth of the the men on the stage. Charlie Gibson chuckles, thinks to self, "Yes... yes, I am rich."
9:59 "BATTLING GREEN EYESHADES!!!!!" Acid flashback? Childhood nightmare?
10:01 "DISEL ENGINES!!!!!!!" Uhm. And then, uhm. . . "SORE SPOT!!!!!" Yes, yes, the environment is a sore spot for you, Mr. President, clearly. . .
10:05 Ah, yes, the great halls of Europe. I think I saw Battling Green Eyeshades there once.
10:10 Did the President of the United States really just ask Charlie Gibson if he "needed wood"? Where's Bob Dole when you really need him. . .
10:15 Ack. A thoughtful, morally-charged question! But Kerry respects the "feeling behind it." After all, he's not pro-stem cell research using cells from "abortions or something like that." Whatever: Kerry is friends with Superman!
10:18 Shorter Bush: He was against embryonic stem cell research before he was for it.
10:21 Ha! Bush said he'd choose judges based on whether or not they'd vote for him! Ha! Ha! Funny because it's true.
10:22 Dred Scott case? Wha? Isn't this teevee? Oh well. At least we know for sure that Bush doesn't support slavery. Whew.
10:28 Q: Name three times you've made a mistake. A: I WAS RIGHT TO GO TO WAR. AND THAT'S A TRICK QUESTION. FUCK YOU.
10:30 Dad Wonkette writes in with his summation: "Kerry waxed Bush's ass." And you wonder how I turned out this way

Business Schools Against Bush

It seems that business academia (not a traditionally left wing bunch) have teamed up and ganged up on Bush. In a devastating critique of his fiscal policy, they join the loud and growing chorus of experts who feel that the current administrations policies will at best require major reversal, and at worst, bankrupt the nation permanently.

Money quote:
What is called for, we believe, is a dramatic reorientation of fiscal policy, including substantial reversals of your tax policy. Running a budget deficit in response to a short bout of recession is one thing. But running large structural deficits over a long period is something else entirely. We therefore urge you to consider the fiscal realities we now face and the substantial burden they are placing on our economy.

As the first MBA President, he gets an F.

Dick Cheney loves George Soros

WHAT A HUGE BLUNDER!!!

Dick Cheney urged millions of viewers to go to factcheck.com to see evidence refuting his preferential treatment of Halliburton. But www.factcheck.com is a George Soros website!! He meant factcheck.org!!!!

Fox News even has the incorrect link on their story: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,134573,00.html

From Fox News:
Cheney said the Halliburton allegations are false and directed voters to factcheck.com, a project of the University of Pennsylvania, to read the truth. He called the issue nothing more than a "smokescreen" by the Kerry-Edwards campaign designed to "repeatedly trying to confuse the voters and raise questions but there's no substance to the charges."


From the transcript:
CHENEY: Well, the reason they keep mentioning Halliburton is because they're trying to throw up a smokescreen. They know the charges are false.
They know that if you go, for example, to factcheck.com (sic), an independent Web site sponsored by the University of Pennsylvania, you can get the specific details with respect to Halliburton.
It's an effort that they've made repeatedly to try to confuse the voters and to raise questions, but there's no substance to the charges.

Mutiny in Iraq

Even the soldiers have had enough. Although no large scale surveys have been done, there has been a marked increase in vocal disenchantment on the part of soldiers stationed in Iraq.

Money quote:
"Nobody I know wants Bush," says an enlisted soldier in Najaf, adding, "This whole war was based on lies." Like several others interviewed, his animosity centered on a belief that the war lacked a clear purpose even as it took a tremendous toll on U.S. troops, many of whom are in Iraq involuntarily under "stop loss" orders that keep them in the service for months beyond their scheduled exit in order to keep units together during deployments.

Is this timed to coincide with Michael Moore's new book? Will They Ever Trust Us Again is a collection of letters from soldiers in Iraq. I haven't read it, but I'd venture to guess they are not supportive of the war.

Republicans lie

But so do Democrats. Zig Zag Zell is so crazy, it is barely worth bringing up again. He was, after all, NOT ELECTED, but rather, appointed by a Republican governor after the death of the sitting Senator.

The bulk of his lies had to do with Kerry's voting record on weapons approrpiations. Zig Zag and the Republicans claim that John Kerry, during his 20 years in the Senate, voted to kill the M-1 tank, the Apache helicopter; the F-14, F-16, and F-18 jet fighters; and just about every other weapon system that has kept our nation free and strong.

The problem is that none of these weapons ever came up for a vote, either on the Senate floor or in any of Kerry's committees.

Ironically, it was Dick Cheney—who was the secretary of defense for George W. Bush's father—was truly slashing the military budget. Here was Secretary Cheney, testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Jan. 31, 1992:

"Overall, since I've been Secretary, we will have taken the five-year defense program down by well over $300 billion. That's the peace dividend. … And now we're adding to that another $50 billion … of so-called peace dividend."

For the full report, see Fred Kaplan's brilliant analysis of Zig Zag in Slate.

Kerry's Top Ten

In case you missed Kerry on Letterman:

10. No estate tax for families with at least two U.S. presidents.
9. W-2 Form is now Dubya-2 Form.
8. Under the simplified tax code, your refund check goes directly to Halliburton.
7. The reduced earned income tax credit is so unfair, it just makes me want to tear out my lustrous, finely groomed hair.
6. Attorney General (John) Ashcroft gets to write off the entire U.S. Constitution.
5. Texas Rangers can take a business loss for trading Sammy Sosa.
4. Eliminate all income taxes; just ask Teresa (Heinz Kerry) to cover the whole damn thing.
3. Cheney can claim Bush as a dependent.
2. Hundred-dollar penalty if you pronounce it "nuclear" instead of "nucular."
1. George W. Bush gets a deduction for mortgaging our entire future.

President Ahnold?

Article II Section I of the US Constitution: No person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty-five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.

Senator Orin Hatch has introduced a resolution to amend the Constitution's ban on non-American-born presidents by allowing people who have been U.S. citizens for at least 20 years to be elected to the White House. While the measure was not introduced with Schwarzenegger in mind, Hatch said the Austrian-born superstar would be a perfect example of why the constitutional amendment is needed.

"If Arnold Schwarzenegger turns out to be the greatest governor of California, which I hope he will, if he turns out to be a tremendous leader and he proves to everybody in this country that he's totally dedicated to this country as an American . . . we would be wrong not to give him that opportunity," said Hatch.

LORD HELP US!!!

Stretched to the Brink

A few yes and no questions about the War on Terror:

Were we attacked by Al Qaeda on 9/11? YES
Were there any Al Qaeda members in Iraq prior to the US invation? NO!!
Was Saddam financing Al Qaeda? NO!!
Were there any Al Qaeda members in Saudia Arabia? YES!
Was Saudia Arabia financing Al Qaeda? YES!!!
Does the same hold true for Iran? YES!!

If we need to defend ourselves against anyone else, will we have the military strength to do so? NO!!!

Our army is stretched to the brink. The NY Times reported on a study commissioned by the Pentagon and approved by Rummy Rumnuts that shows we are weak. The Democrats have been clamoring to increase the size of the military, to no avail.

An article published Thursday by Inside the Pentagon, a military affairs newsletter, quoted the study as concluding that "current and projected force structure will not sustain our current and projected global stabilization commitments."

The Best Article on the War in Iraq Ever Written

Naomi Klein, the Canadian writer of No Logo (itself one of the best books on the effects of marketing and branding), has written the best article I have seen to date on the situation in Iraq. In this September's issue of Harper's, she articulates the neo-con justification for the war as a way to create the wet-dream world of zero regulation. Here are some highlights, and the central thesis:

"A similar theory applies to economic shock therapy, or "shock treatment," ... The theory is that if painful economic "adjustments" are brought in rapidly and in the aftermath of a seismic social disruption like a war, a coup, or a government collapse, the population will be so stunned, and so preoccupied with the daily pressures of survival, that it too will go into suspended animation, unable to resist...

...The tone of Bremer's tenure was set with his first major act on the job: he fired 500,000 state workers, most of them soldiers, but also doctors, nurses, teachers, publishers, and printers. Next, he flung open the country's borders to absolutely unrestricted imports: no tariffs, no duties, no inspections, no taxes. Iraq, Bremer declared two weeks after he arrived, was "open for business." ...

...But Bremer's economic engineering had only just begun. In September, to entice foreign investors to come to Iraq, he enacted a radical set of laws unprecedented in their generosity to multinational corporations. There was Order 37, which lowered Iraq's corporate tax rate from roughly 40 percent to a flat 15 percent. There was Order 39, which allowed foreign companies to own 100 percent of Iraqi assets outside of the natural-resource sector. Even better, investors could take 100 percent of the profits they made in Iraq out of the country; they would not be required to reinvest and they would not be taxed. Under Order 39, they could sign leases and contracts that would last for forty years. Order 40 welcomed foreign banks to Iraq under the same favorable terms. All that remained of Saddam Hussein's economic policies was a law restricting trade unions and collective bargaining.

...If these policies sound familiar, it's because they are the same ones multinationals around the world lobby for from national governments and in international trade agreements. But while these reforms are only ever enacted in part, or in fits and starts, Bremer delivered them all, all at once. Overnight, Iraq went from being the most isolated country in the world to being, on paper, its widest-open market. "

Hood-winked

Florida Secretary of State Glenda Hood is so clearly a shill for the Bush crime family.
She has has now re-instated Nader on the Florida ballot, despite having agreed last week with the injunction from Leon Circuit Judge Kevin Davey.

Email her, or call her at (850) 245-6125 and let her know she's aiding criminals. She obviously KNOWS she committing a crime. Otherwise, why would she have hired, over the weekend, Bush's 2000 Florida recount lawyer?

Republican Help Wanted

Apparently, this Republicans are only looking to hire Republicans. A woman in Alabama was recently fired from her job because she had a Kerry sticker on her car. Have politics EVER been this polarized?

An Arab League of Their Own

Even as the head of the Arab League, Amr Moussa, declared the "gates of hell" open in Iraq, Bush hasn't said a word about the war in the last few days. All of a sudden, it's Medicare?! Bush says he's "proud of his service", but will anyone claim the $50,000 prize to prove he even showed up for duty?

One thing this campaign has demonstrated is that the Republicans are masters at staying one step ahead of the issues. They deflected the economic reports during the RNC by focusing on security, and now they've shifted to tax relief and health care reform just as Iraq is blowing up and new documentaries are coming out about how unsafe we are. Kudos Bushie.

Just listen to the woooorrrrrds.....

Sadly, the best coverage of the election is to be found on the Daily with Jon Stewart. Last week, genius Steven Colbert aired W's Words, a brilliant portrayal of W's flip-floppery and general malevolent manipularity.

For more funny, try The Daily Show's coverage Bush's acceptance speech, or Colbert's coverage of the RNC.

Looking for Mr. Right Wing

Hilarious and depressing article about delusional right-wingers looking for love in all the wrong places. Choire Sicha, from the much loved New York Observer tries to figure them out. Does anyone know if Choire is a boy or a girl? ANYONE? What the hell name is that?

The Unprotected Homefront: We Are NOT Safer

In this month's non-partisan Foreign Affairs magazine, Stephen Flynn (Senior Fellow in National Security Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations think tank) explains why, for all his bluster, Bush has made us less safe at home. While defeating Saddam may have been a virtuous cause (although I highly doubt it was done for virtuous reasons), Bush has neglected to protect taxpaying Americans at home.

Highlights:
According to President Bush's 2002 National Homeland Security Strategy, "The government should only address those activities that the market does not adequately provide -- for example, national defense or border security. ... For other aspects of homeland security, sufficient incentives exist in the private market to supply protection."

The Republican Noise Machine

David Brock, the reformed conservative noise-maker, on how the Right has sabotaged journalism, democracy, and truth.

Beyond Betrayal: Gay Republicans

Barry Yoeman writes a scathing piece in Mother Jones about the gay Republicans and how they essentially pour steak sauce on their heads on a daily basis and get in front of meat-eating, redneck Republicans looking to be embraced.

The Jewish Vote

The Republicans would like to make you believe that they are making headway on the Jewish Vote, but their pandering is for naught. Jeff Fleischer writes about this highly sought after minority in August's Mother Jones Magazine.

Kerry's Voting Record

For a detailed list of John Kerry's congressional voting record, click here.

July 28, 2004: Diplomats & Military Commanders for Change

July 28, 2004
For a list of signatories, click here.

AMERICANS ARE LESS SAFE UNDER BUSH ADMINISTRATION POLICIESWHY AMERICA IS LESS SECURE

President Bush asserts that America is safer as a result of the war in Iraq. But, according to recent Gallup, CBS and NBC polls, Americans increasingly feel less secure because of the war. They are right. While the president declared victory in Afghanistan after the major battles with Al Qaeda, it is clear Al Qaeda is still active, and according to senior Bush Administration officials is currently plotting new attacks against the US from the Afghan-Pakistan border. Al Qaeda has also worked successfully to help new terrorist organizations and activities around the world – Indonesia, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, and Spain – as well as Iraq.

In Afghanistan, the US has been diverted by war in Iraq into a woefully inadequate investment of military, financial and political resources – including the leadership needed to mobilize strong international support. Military and reconstruction assistance levels per capita by the US and its NATO allies are about one tenth of that for Bosnia and Kosovo. As a result, security has declined, opium production is soaring (90% of world total), Taliban has made a comeback, planned parliamentary elections for October have been postponed, and international assistance workers have ceased to operate in many provinces. After two and one half years of trumpeting victory, we are bogged down. Our enemies are encouraged.

In Iraq, we are also bogged down in insurgency and terrorism. The mission has not been accomplished, despite political changes and a belated role for the United Nations. American and Iraqi casualties continue to mount. Security is highly problematic and the political future is murky. The US occupation of an Islamic country is seen by most in the Muslin world as comparable to the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. Muslim fighters flock to Iraq as they once did to Afghanistan. Our friends are discouraged and unwilling to contribute the needed additional resources, even to protect the new UN Representative. Some countries and companies have pulled out, under threat. Our enemies around the world are heartened.

The perception of US military strength is being eroded, as equipment and personnel and budgets are strained to the limit in Iraq. Once again, as in Vietnam, Lebanon and Somalia, highly superior US forces are now seen as vulnerable to guerilla warfare and terrorism. The deterrent value of US military might has been weakened.

Iran and North Korea, the other two members of the “Axis of Evil”, have not been intimidated by threats of unilateral US preemptive action. Nor have they responded to ambivalent United States diplomacy. As a result, North Korea is apparently producing more nuclear weapons and Iran has continued to develop its nuclear capacity. Due to the situation in Iraq, Iran is also assuming an increasingly powerful regional role.

Absent a truly serious visible effort to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or restrain the aggressive Israeli tactics on the ground, the US is increasingly identified in the Arab world as totally supportive of Israeli PM Sharon’s policies. This further exacerbates worldwide Muslim anger at the US over Iraq, undercuts efforts at reform, and increases likelihood of future anti-US terrorism among young people.

In short, progress in the struggle against terrorism has been offset by faulty policy. The overall result is that the Bush Administration’s war in Iraq leaves the United States less secure rather than more. It is time for a change.

June 16th Diplomats and Military Commanders for Change

June 16, 2004
For a list of signatories, click here.

Deep concern about the current state of our nation's international relations compels us, 27 men and women who have served the United States in senior diplomatic, national security, and Military positions, to speak out and call for a fundamental change in the United States' approach to foreign policy.

Let me note that we did not seek large numbers of supporters for our statement--we have assembled a varied and representative group of like-minded former senior career officials. Since news of the statement came out, we have been besieged by calls from friends and colleagues around the world who have offered support and encouragement. This is very gratifying.

Before reading the statement, I would add that to be involved in an act that will be seen by many as political if not partisan is for many of us a new experience. As career government officials, we have served loyally both Republican and Democratic administrations. We have not only worked overseas; we have also held positions of major responsibility in the Department of State, Department of Defense, National Security Council, and at the United Nations. For many of us, such an overt step is very hard to do and we have made our decisions after deep reflection.

We believe we have as good an understanding as any of our citizens of basic American interests. Over nearly half a century we have worked energetically in all regions of the world, often in very difficult circumstances, to build piece by piece a structure of respect and influence for the United States that has served our county very well over the last 60 years.

Today we see that structure crumbling under an administration blinded by ideology and a callous indifference to the realities of the world around it. Never before have so many of us felt the need for a major change in the direction of our foreign policy.

We will be among the first to recognize that the nation currently faces unprecedented threats. We recognize too that the Bush administration is now reaching out to allies. But everything we have heard from friends abroad on every continent suggests to us that the lack of confidence in the present administration in Washington is so profound that a whole new team is needed to repair the damage. Repair it we must, we believe, as the future security and well being of the United States depends on it.

The undersigned have held positions of responsibility for the planning and execution of American foreign and defense policy. Collectively, we have served every president since Harry S. Truman. Some of us are Democrats, some are Republicans or Independents, many voted for George W. Bush. But we all believe that current Administration policies have failed in the primary responsibilities of preserving national security and providing world leadership. Serious issues are at stake. We need a change.

From the outset, President George W. Bush adopted an overbearing approach to America’s role in the world, relying upon military might and righteousness, insensitive to the concerns of traditional friends and allies, and disdainful of the United Nations. Instead of building upon America’s great economic and moral strength to lead other nations in a coordinated campaign to address the causes of terrorism and to stifle its resources, the Administration, motivated more by ideology than by reasoned analysis, struck out on its own. It led the United States into an ill-planned and costly war from which exit is uncertain. It justified the invasion of Iraq by manipulation of uncertain intelligence about weapons of mass destruction, and by a cynical campaign to persuade the public that Saddam Hussein was linked to Al Qaeda and the attacks of September 11. The evidence did not support this argument.

Our security has been weakened. While American airmen and women, marines, soldiers and sailors have performed gallantly, our armed forces were not prepared for military occupation and nation building. Public opinion polls throughout the world report hostility toward us. Muslim youth are turning to anti-American terrorism. Never in the two and a quarter centuries of our history has the United States been so isolated among the nations, so broadly feared and distrusted. No loyal American would question our ultimate right to act alone in our national interest; but responsible leadership would not turn to unilateral military action before diplomacy had been thoroughly explored.

The United States suffers from close identification with autocratic regimes in the Muslim world, and from the perception of unquestioning support for the policies and actions of the present Israeli Government. To enhance credibility with Islamic peoples we must pursue courageous, energetic and balanced efforts to establish peace between Israelis and Palestinians, and policies that encourage responsible democratic reforms.

We face profound challenges in the 21st Century: proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, unequal distribution of wealth and the fruits of globalization, terrorism, environmental degradation, population growth in the developing world, HIV/AIDS, ethnic and religious confrontations. Such problems can not be resolved by military force, nor by the sole remaining superpower alone; they demand patient, coordinated global effort under the leadership of the United States.

The Bush Administration has shown that it does not grasp these circumstances of the new era, and is not able to rise to the responsibilities of world leadership in either style or substance. It is time for a change.

Bush's Bogus Medals

GUEST CONTRIBUTION by Bob Fertik

Wearing an unearned medal is certainly a "character" issue of the highest order.
In 1996, when Admiral Jeremy Boorda, Chief of US Naval Operations, was presented with evidence that he wore medals that he had not earned, he committed suicide in disgrace.
And this is not the first time a prominent Bush has been accused of unearned medals. Bush's grandfather Prescott was caught with bogus medal claims during WW I, a humiliation that drove him out of his home town of Columbus OH.

The media needs to demand the truth from Bush about his medals -- and about his still-unexplained grounding.

Flip Flopper in Chief

1. Social Security Surplus
BUSH PLEDGES NOT TO TOUCH SOCIAL SECURITY SURPLUS... "We're going to keep the promise of Social Security and keep the government from raiding the Social Security surplus." [President Bush, 3/3/01]
...BUSH SPENDS SOCIAL SECURITY SURPLUS The New York Times reported that "the president's new budget uses Social Security surpluses to pay for other programs every year through 2013, ultimately diverting more than $1.4 trillion in Social Security funds to other purposes." [The New York Times, 2/6/02]

2. Patient's Right to Sue
GOVERNOR BUSH VETOES PATIENTS' RIGHT TO SUE... "Despite his campaign rhetoric in favor of a patients' bill of rights, Bush fought such a bill tooth and nail as Texas governor, vetoing a bill coauthored by Republican state Rep. John Smithee in 1995. He... constantly opposed a patient's right to sue an HMO over coverage denied that resulted in adverse health effects." [Salon, 2/7/01]
...CANDIDATE BUSH PRAISES TEXAS PATIENTS' RIGHT TO SUE... "We're one of the first states that said you can sue an HMO for denying you proper coverage... It's time for our nation to come together and do what's right for the people. And I think this is right for the people. You know, I support a national patients' bill of rights, Mr. Vice President. And I want all people covered. I don't want the law to supersede good law like we've got in Texas." [Governor Bush, 10/17/00]
...PRESIDENT BUSH'S ADMINISTRATION ARGUES AGAINST RIGHT TO SUE "To let two Texas consumers, Juan Davila and Ruby R. Calad, sue their managed-care companies for wrongful denials of medical benefits ‘would be to completely undermine' federal law regulating employee benefits, Assistant Solicitor General James A. Feldman said at oral argument March 23. Moreover, the administration's brief attacked the policy rationale for Texas's law, which is similar to statutes on the books in nine other states." [Washington Post, 4/5/04]

3. Tobacco Buyout
BUSH SUPPORTS CURRENT TOBACCO FARMERS' QUOTA SYSTEM... "They've got the quota system in place -- the allotment system -- and I don't think that needs to be changed." [President Bush, 5/04]
...BUSH ADMINISTRATION WILL SUPPORT FEDERAL BUYOUT OF TOBACCO QUOTAS "The administration is open to a buyout." [White House spokeswoman Jeanie Mamo, 6/18/04]

4. North Korea
BUSH WILL NOT OFFER NUCLEAR NORTH KOREA INCENTIVES TO DISARM... "We developed a bold approach under which, if the North addressed our long-standing concerns, the United States was prepared to take important steps that would have significantly improved the lives of the North Korean people. Now that North Korea's covert nuclear weapons program has come to light, we are unable to pursue this approach." [President's Statement, 11/15/02]
...BUSH ADMINISTRATION OFFERS NORTH KOREA INCENTIVES TO DISARM "Well, we will work to take steps to ease their political and economic isolation. So there would be -- what you would see would be some provisional or temporary proposals that would only lead to lasting benefit after North Korea dismantles its nuclear programs. So there would be some provisional or temporary efforts of that nature." [White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan, 6/23/04]

5. Abortion
BUSH SUPPORTS A WOMAN'S RIGHT TO CHOOSE... "Bush said he...favors leaving up to a woman and her doctor the abortion question." [The Nation, 6/15/00, quoting the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, 5/78]
...BUSH OPPOSES A WOMAN'S RIGHT TO CHOOSE "I am pro-life." [Governor Bush, 10/3/00]

6. OPEC
BUSH PROMISES TO FORCE OPEC TO LOWER PRICES... "What I think the president ought to do [when gas prices spike] is he ought to get on the phone with the OPEC cartel and say we expect you to open your spigots...And the president of the United States must jawbone OPEC members to lower the price." [President Bush, 1/26/00]
...BUSH REFUSES TO LOBBY OPEC LEADERS With gas prices soaring in the United States at the beginning of 2004, the Miami Herald reported the president refused to "personally lobby oil cartel leaders to change their minds." [Miami Herald, 4/1/04]

7. Iraq Funding
BUSH SPOKESMAN DENIES NEED FOR ADDITIONAL FUNDS FOR THE REST OF 2004... "We do not anticipate requesting supplemental funding for '04" [White House Budget Director Joshua Bolton, 2/2/04]
...BUSH REQUESTS ADDITIONAL FUNDS FOR IRAQ FOR 2004 "I am requesting that Congress establish a $25 billion contingency reserve fund for the coming fiscal year to meet all commitments to our troops." [President Bush, Statement by President, 5/5/04]

8. Condoleeza Rice Testimony
BUSH SPOKESMAN SAYS RICE WON'T TESTIFY AS 'A MATTER OF PRINCIPLE'... "Again, this is not her personal preference; this goes back to a matter of principle. There is a separation of powers issue involved here. Historically, White House staffers do not testify before legislative bodies. So it's a matter of principle, not a matter of preference." [White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan, 3/9/04]
...BUSH ORDERS RICE TO TESTIFY: "Today I have informed the Commission on Terrorist Attacks Against the United States that my National Security Advisor, Dr. Condoleezza Rice, will provide public testimony." [President Bush, 3/30/04]

9. Science
BUSH PLEDGES TO ISSUE REGULATIONS BASED ON SCIENCE... "I think we ought to have high standards set by agencies that rely upon science, not by what may feel good or what sounds good." [then-Governor George W. Bush, 1/15/00]
...BUSH ADMINISTRATION REGULATIONS IGNORE SCIENCE "60 leading scientists—including Nobel laureates, leading medical experts, former federal agency directors and university chairs and presidents—issued a statement calling for regulatory and legislative action to restore scientific integrity to federal policymaking. According to the scientists, the Bush administration has, among other abuses, suppressed and distorted scientific analysis from federal agencies, and taken actions that have undermined the quality of scientific advisory panels." [Union of Concerned Scientists, 2/18/04]

10. Ahmed Chalabi
BUSH INVITES CHALABI TO STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS... President Bush also met with Chalabi during his brief trip to Iraq last Thanksgiving [White House Documents 1/20/04, 11/27/03]
...BUSH MILITARY ASSISTS IN RAID OF CHALABI'S HOUSE "U.S. soldiers raided the home of America's one-time ally Ahmad Chalabi on Thursday and seized documents and computers." [Washington Post, 5/20/04]

11. Department of Homeland Security
BUSH OPPOSES THE DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY... "So, creating a Cabinet office doesn't solve the problem. You still will have agencies within the federal government that have to be coordinated. So the answer is that creating a Cabinet post doesn't solve anything." [White House spokesman Ari Fleischer, 3/19/02]
...BUSH SUPPORTS THE DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY "So tonight, I ask the Congress to join me in creating a single, permanent department with an overriding and urgent mission: securing the homeland of America and protecting the American people." [President Bush, Address to the Nation, 6/6/02]

12. Weapons of Mass Destruction
BUSH SAYS WE FOUND THE WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION..."We found the weapons of mass destruction. We found biological laboratories...for those who say we haven't found the banned manufacturing devices or banned weapons, they're wrong, we found them." [President Bush, Interview in Poland, 5/29/03]
...BUSH SAYS WE HAVEN'T FOUND WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION "David Kay has found the capacity to produce weapons.And when David Kay goes in and says we haven't found stockpiles yet, and there's theories as to where the weapons went. They could have been destroyed during the war. Saddam and his henchmen could have destroyed them as we entered into Iraq. They could be hidden. They could have been transported to another country, and we'll find out." [President Bush, Meet the Press, 2/7/04]

13. Free Trade
BUSH SUPPORTS FREE TRADE... "I believe strongly that if we promote trade, and when we promote trade, it will help workers on both sides of this issue." [President Bush in Peru, 3/23/02]
...BUSH SUPPORTS RESTRICTIONS ON TRADE "In a decision largely driven by his political advisers, President Bush set aside his free-trade principles last year and imposed heavy tariffs on imported steel to help out struggling mills in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, two states crucial for his reelection." [Washington Post, 9/19/03]

14. Osama Bin Laden
BUSH WANTS OSAMA DEAD OR ALIVE... "I want justice. And there's an old poster out West, I recall, that says, 'Wanted: Dead or Alive.'" [President Bush, on Osama Bin Laden, 09/17/01]
...BUSH DOESN'T CARE ABOUT OSAMA "I don't know where he is.You know, I just don't spend that much time on him... I truly am not that concerned about him."[President Bush, Press Conference, 3/13/02]

15. The Environment
BUSH SUPPORTS MANDATORY CAPS ON CARBON DIOXIDE... "[If elected], Governor Bush will work to...establish mandatory reduction targets for emissions of four main pollutants: sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, mercury and carbon dioxide." [Bush Environmental Plan, 9/29/00]
...BUSH OPPOSES MANDATORY CAPS ON CARBON DIOXIDE "I do not believe, however, that the government should impose on power plants mandatory emissions reductions for carbon dioxide, which is not a 'pollutant' under the Clean Air Act." [President Bush, Letter to Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE), 3/13/03]

16. WMD Commission
BUSH RESISTS AN OUTSIDE INVESTIGATION ON WMD INTELLIGENCE FAILURE... "The White House immediately turned aside the calls from Kay and many Democrats for an immediate outside investigation, seeking to head off any new wide-ranging election-year inquiry that might go beyond reports already being assembled by congressional committees and the Central Intelligence Agency." [NY Times, 1/29/04]
...BUSH SUPPORTS AN OUTSIDE INVESTIGATION ON WMD INTELLIGENCE FAILURE "Today, by executive order, I am creating an independent commission, chaired by Governor and former Senator Chuck Robb, Judge Laurence Silberman, to look at American intelligence capabilities, especially our intelligence about weapons of mass destruction." [President Bush, 2/6/04]

17. Creation of the 9/11 Commission
BUSH OPPOSES CREATION OF INDEPENDENT 9/11 COMMISSION... "President Bush took a few minutes during his trip to Europe Thursday to voice his opposition to establishing a special commission to probe how the government dealt with terror warnings before Sept. 11." [CBS News, 5/23/02]
...BUSH SUPPORTS CREATION OF INDEPENDENT 9/11 COMMISSION "President Bush said today he now supports establishing an independent commission to investigate the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks." [ABC News, 09/20/02]

18. Time Extension for 9/11 Commission
BUSH OPPOSES TIME EXTENSION FOR 9/11 COMMISSION... "President Bush and House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) have decided to oppose granting more time to an independent commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks." [Washington Post, 1/19/04]
...BUSH SUPPORTS TIME EXTENSION FOR 9/11 COMMISSION "The White House announced Wednesday its support for a request from the commission investigating the September 11, 2001 attacks for more time to complete its work." [CNN, 2/4/04]

19. One Hour Limit for 9/11 Commission Testimony
BUSH LIMITS TESTIMONY IN FRONT OF 9/11 COMMISSION TO ONE HOUR... "President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have placed strict limits on the private interviews they will grant to the federal commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks, saying that they will meet only with the panel's top two officials and that Mr. Bush will submit to only a single hour of questioning, commission members said Wednesday." [NY Times, 2/26/04]
...BUSH SETS NO TIMELIMIT FOR TESTIMONY "The president's going to answer all of the questions they want to raise. Nobody's watching the clock." [White House spokesman Scott McClellan, 3/10/04]

20. Gay Marriage
BUSH SAYS GAY MARRIAGE IS A STATE ISSUE... "The state can do what they want to do. Don't try to trap me in this state's issue like you're trying to get me into." [Gov. George W. Bush on Gay Marriage, Larry King Live, 2/15/00]
...BUSH SUPPORTS CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT BANNING GAY MARRIAGE "Today I call upon the Congress to promptly pass, and to send to the states for ratification, an amendment to our Constitution defining and protecting marriage as a union of man and woman as husband and wife." [President Bush, 2/24/04]

21. Nation Building
BUSH OPPOSES NATION BUILDING... "If we don't stop extending our troops all around the world in nation-building missions, then we're going to have a serious problem coming down the road." [Gov. George W. Bush, 10/3/00]
...BUSH SUPPORTS NATION BUILDING "We will be changing the regime of Iraq, for the good of the Iraqi people." [President Bush, 3/6/03]

22. Saddam/al Qaeda Link
BUSH SAYS IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO DISTINGUISH BETWEEEN AL QAEDA AND SADDAM... "You can't distinguish between al Qaeda and Saddam when you talk about the war on terror." [President Bush, 9/25/02]
...BUSH SAYS SADDAM HAD NO ROLE IN AL QAEDA PLOT "We've had no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved in Sept. 11." [President Bush, 9/17/03]

23. U.N. Resolution
BUSH VOWS TO HAVE A UN VOTE NO MATTER WHAT... "No matter what the whip count is, we're calling for the vote. We want to see people stand up and say what their opinion is about Saddam Hussein and the utility of the United Nations Security Council. And so, you bet. It's time for people to show their cards, to let the world know where they stand when it comes to Saddam." [President Bush 3/6/03]
...BUSH WITHDRAWS REQUEST FOR VOTE "At a National Security Council meeting convened at the White House at 8:55 a.m., Bush finalized the decision to withdraw the resolution from consideration and prepared to deliver an address to the nation that had already been written." [Washington Post, 3/18/03]

24. Involvement in the Palestinian Conflict
BUSH OPPOSES SUMMITS... "Well, we've tried summits in the past, as you may remember. It wasn't all that long ago where a summit was called and nothing happened, and as a result we had significant intifada in the area." [President Bush, 04/05/02]
...BUSH SUPPORTS SUMMITS "If a meeting advances progress toward two states living side by side in peace, I will strongly consider such a meeting. I'm committed to working toward peace in the Middle East." [President Bush, 5/23/03]

25. Campaign Finance
BUSH OPPOSES MCCAIN-FEINGOLD... "George W. Bush opposes McCain-Feingold...as an infringement on free expression." [Washington Post, 3/28/2000]
...BUSH SIGNS MCCAIN-FEINGOLD INTO LAW "[T]his bill improves the current system of financing for Federal campaigns, and therefore I have signed it into law." [President Bush, at the McCain-Feingold signing ceremony, 03/27/02]